Postgame Quotes - February 3, 2012

Pistons vs Bucks

(On holding the Bucks to 35% field goal and 17% from beyond the arc): “I think it goes three quarters of 20 or less (points). (Brandon) Jennings in the second half had four points and zero in the fourth quarter; and even when we went dry offensively, our resolve, our toughness, our ability to get stops was impressive tonight.”

(On Brandon Knight’s energy against Jennings) “I think he really wrote the challenge, Brandon Jennings had two games prior, and you look at what Jennings averaged against us, almost 24 points per game, shooting 57%, and Brandon, right from the start really took the challenge; and another thing that was very pivotal in terms of the Jennings match up was Walker Russell in the fourth. His ability to be able to guard Jennings and now Brandon (Knight) doesn’t have to exert all that effort and energy totally on the ball. But I thought Brandon (Knight) really responded. That’s two very strong performances he has put together. I thought he played very well in (New) Jersey too.”

(On Brandon Knight’s overall performance): “I thought he (Brandon Knight) was outstanding. I thought we had a bunch of noble plays tonight; I thought Jason Maxiell was terrific as well. Guys stepped up and when you hold a team at 80 points defensively you know that everyone on the floor contributes to that, and that deserves more credit than anything else.”

(On the team being more consistent): “Well, I mean that is obviously a challenge for every single team in the NBA. If that was the case then every team would be 82-0. This is a tough league and there are a lot of things that impact performance, so it’s some are within and some are your opponents. Certain nights things are clicking well, other nights you are not as precise, you are not as sharp, there are a lot of different variables with it. To me, we put together two great games. I thought that even despite the loss (in New Jersey), we did some encouraging things and then we got back home and we built on it and now tomorrow is another challenge.”

(On playing against Brandon Jennings): "It wasn't about an individual thing. For me, at the end of the day, it's all about wins and losses. I thought today we came out with a win, that was really the main thing. I know I was playing against a really good point guard and he's playing really well, but it's not about that. It was just about doing my part and my teammates doing their part to get a win.”

(On advantage of playing Milwaukee already): "It helped a lot because we knew what they were about and we knew how they beat us the first times and we wanted to take that away."

(On game): "Well we were terrible in every aspect of the game. There’s no reason to sugarcoat, our effort was awful; total lack of focus and concentration. Just a very, very poor effort, one of the worst I’ve seen. Our execution was sloppy. The defense had no will on the board and gambled for steals. Just about everything you could do we did to cause us to lose the game. We still had a chance to try to steal it but then even our last several possessions there wasn't any quality in them."

(on rebounding): "Some teams have some size on us but we weren't even active. We weren't even jumping. There's no reason to sugarcoat it. Our last eight quarters we played two good ones, the other six have been pretty pitiful."

(On if he was surprised by the loss): "I don't know. I've been in the league a long time; I'm not really surprised by anything anymore. I'm disappointed, I'm really disappointed. That’s all we can come up with. I don't want to take anything away from the Pistons. I don't want to make it seem like they didn't have a good game or didn't win but we didn't play anything like we've been playing the last couple weeks."

(on game): "Besides Brandon (Jennings) in that first half and Tobias (Harris) in that second half, we had guys that shots just weren't falling down for us including myself."

(On effort): "I think it’s a whole. It's a loss for everybody including the coaching staff. I feel like all of us were asleep at the wheel tonight."

(On his play): "It was tough game, we have one tomorrow. That’s the good news; we have one tomorrow. The bad news is it’s the Chicago Bulls."

(On if they underestimated the Pistons): "Not at all. We knew this was going to be a tough game. I knew this was going to be a tough game. We all talked about how tough of a game this was going to be. We bought into that more than we believed and the outcome was a loss."